hop2jr

Whats up guy's aand girls will here is whats going on. Started a 29gal Jan 1st was cycling it when my gf's monsy gave birth 2 24 fry in a 10gal tank with 5 other fish so we put them in the 29gal. Tank was doing great amonia was 0 nitrites where coming down lost 6 fry to the filter so have 18. put in 2 kuli loaches, 2 AB Corys and 1 butterfly loach. The fry will be leaving so giving them 2 freinds and keeping 3. I do weekly water changes and latly the water is cloudy amonia is .25 Nitrites 2.0 and nitrates 5.0 using a API Master kit to test water with. Fish are fine but I don't get the spike in amonia ands nitrite been like this for a week just did a water change today and still cloudy and I use Prime in the water. Any idea's?

AggieYen

What's happened is because you added quite a few fish in at the same time, your bacteria is trying to catch up to the added bio-load. Basically your tank is now cycling again. Do water changes as often as you can to keep your nitrites and ammonia down. I'd say a water change every other day. The cloudiness is your bacterial bloom, trying to catch up to the bioload.

A general rule is to only add about 2-3 fish per week. Hope this helps.

hop2jr

will this happen every time I add fish? I'm using a Whisper 60 on a 29gal tank wanted the extra current for the butterfly loaches and using 2 small airstones. can you over filter a tank?

AggieYen

As long as you only add about 2 fish a week, giving a week for bacteria to catch up before adding more, you'll be fine. Even if you are adding schooling fish, add them slowly to build up to the appropriate school amount.

Not sure about the filter, I'm afraid. My gut feel is filters are good, so your Whisper and airstones sound about right, but i'm sure others better informed will give you better advice.

Tavel

You can not over-filter...at least it won't do any harm. The most harm would come from spending too much money on a giant filter

The whisper 60 should hold plenty of bacteria, and do plenty of aeration at the same time. (air stones just look pretty, they don't really aerate much).

Did you just change the filter cartridges? Change them as little as possible. Really just rinse them out and replace the charcoal, but only do one side per week.

Do you have the water level too high? Bring the water to just past the decorative rim on the tank (put another way: as low as possible without the waterline visible from outside). You want the water to cascade into the tank. I've found that bringing the water up too high after water change can cause the tank to go cloudy and smell foul.

hop2jr

Ya I got the whisper 60 from a petco going out of busnus sale for 25 bucks. I added the airstones behind the fish bowl for water movement for my butterfly loach love to sit in the bubles and suck the glass from the bowl I thought it would give him the effect of a rolling hillstream so far he loves it.

hop2jr

Ohh update on water getting clearer my nitrite are finally at 0 natrates 20 but the amonia kicked up .25. going to do a water change so but what is a safe nitrate level?

andy65

20 is a bit high. I like to keep mine at 10 or below.
It take a lot more nitrates compared to ammonia for it to make the fish sick.

hop2jr

see I heard 40 was high

Tavel

40 is safe for fish, but anything above 20 is going to give you terrible algae headaches.

hop2jr

Thanks does that mean more or less algee